After its Spring 2020 issue Playboy magazine will stop printing regular editions in the U.S.
“We have decided that our Spring 2020 Issue, which arrives on U.S. newsstands and as a digital download this week, will be our final printed publication for the year in the U.S.”
They add
Playboy will now operate on a “digital first publishing schedule,” the company said, including its famed Playmate shoots. But it does intend to bring some kind of a print product back into the fold next year, Kohn said in his note. Likely an occasional special edition.
WWD carries the breaking news. Hat tip to Michael Maslin.
At one time this would have been major cartooning news, as Playboy was one of the top echelon markets for cartoonists. But the days of Hefner and the magazine’s devotion to cartooning are long past, as are the days of Playboy cartoons.
above: B. Kliban, Playboy, August 1982
In spite of their appalling treatment of the magazine cartoon in the recent past, the magazine does deserve a to be honored for the decades under Hugh Hefner’s reign when the cartoons were an integral part of the operation.
Doug Sneyd, John Dempsey, Charles W. Miller, Erich Sokol, Phil Interlandi, Eldon Dedini, Edmond Kiraz, Dean Yeagle, Gahan Wilson, Dink Siegel, Rowland B. Wilson, Roy Raymonde, Al Stine, Jack Cole, Bo Brown, E. Simms Campbell. And hundreds more like Shel Silverstein, Arnold Roth, Kurtzman and Elder, Jules Feifffer. The Glory Days.
To relive some of those times, adults can go to the Playboy tags at The Magic Whistle.
